Rescript Not Allowing Yu Gyeonghyeon (庾敬玄) to Decline the Office of Examiner for the Supervisory Examination庾敬玄讓監試試員不允批答
云云。甚矣人之難知也。若夫身之脩短則揣而可知。貌之妍醜則察而可識。至於才也行也智也。藏於心蘊於性。固不以身貌知之。故於是有章句詞藝之選。以此取人。猶有紫眩朱哇亂雅。欺冒有司者。是以。榜出之後。考官之免受人謗者鮮矣。其任豈不重哉。爾夤緣科第。揚歷淸華。官爵之早顯。則似可言於世家。文章之夙成則是豈繫於門地。由是觀之。官爵亦專以才華。而非必由閥閱也。草予制勅。眞古典謨。詞爲汝詞。意則朕意。簡而詳麗而實。則燕許之手也。安有已能若是而未能精品人才者耶。故朕選簪紳之列。假衡石之權。必欲使杞梓之才竝收。騏驥之種盡縶。嶺無亭菊。谷絶幽蘭。是朕之期於爾者也。其藉何辭。遽陳玆讓。云云。
And so forth.
How grave it is, the hardness of knowing men! The length or shortness of a body can be known by measuring, and the fairness or foulness of a form by looking; but when it comes to talent, to conduct, and to wisdom, these are hidden in the heart and heaped up in the nature, and truly cannot be known from body and form. Therefore here there is a law of choosing by phrase and by skill in letters, and by this men are taken. Even so there are those who deceive the man in charge, as purple muddies red and a vulgar sound disorders the right melody. For this reason, after the list is posted up, few examiners escape the ill words of others; how then should the charge not be weighty?
You made the examination your footing and passed through pure and splendid offices all round. That your office appeared early might be put down to a house that has held office generation after generation; but that your composition was early accomplished — how should that be bound to lineage? Seen thus, your office too was got wholly by talent and brilliance, and did not of necessity come of lineage.
Your drafting of my rescripts is truly like the writings of the old Book of Documents. The words are your words, but the intent is my intent. Brief yet full, fair yet solid: this is the hand of the Duke of Yan and the Duke of Xu. Being already of this measure, where should there be one unable to reckon talent exactly?
Therefore I have chosen you from among the ranks of officials and lend you the authority of the balance. That you should gather in together all talents that are like good timber and tie up every strain of the thousand-li horse, leaving behind neither the chrysanthemum that blooms alone upon the ridge nor the orchid hidden in the valley — this is what I look for from you. Upon what word do you lean, that you send up this refusal of a sudden?
And so forth.